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Letters to The Mindfulness Bell
There isn't anything that touches my soul more deeply than
your newsletter, especially Thich Nhat Hanh's Dharma talk.
I cherish it, I carry it with me to many places, I reread it
when I need to be reminded of the Way. I have read many
important messages, good articles and books, but none have
touched me more than Thay's words. They have literally
transformed me, although I keep working on all of the
precepts. Thank you for being there and taking the effort to
transmit his teachings, which are so in touch with human
weaknesses.
Lorraine Keller de Schietekat
Mexico City, Mexico
I am a hospice nurse and carry a pager whenever I am away
from home. Usually when I am paged I don't get upset, but
yesterday morning I was on my way to work, my pager
went off and, much to my chagrin, my reaction was
"!*@*!" I realized that, to the person who paged me, it was
necessary and not done to annoy me. I drove back up the
mountain road to my home, phoned in, took care of the
problem, and went on to work.
Issue 17 of The Mindfulness Bell was waiting for me
when I got home that night. The next morning I read the
tributes to Jim Fauss. I first heard of Jim when I read of his
death in the last issue. I, too, was struck by his smile. I read
Maxine Hong Kingston's words, "He has an immortal
smile, which he taught to the people who rode his bus. A
passenger pulled the bell cord, and Jim took a joyful breath
and smiled." Those words rang a bell in my mind and I
immediately thought of my reaction to my pager. I decided
that my pager would become my "pager of mindfulness."
Each time it goes off I am reminded to breathe joyfully and
smile. Thanks to Jim and to Maxine for sharing her story of
him. I am reminded by this how interconnected we are, how
we truly are a part of one another. Even though I never met
Jim Fauss, I have been profoundly influenced by him and
will continue to be each time my pager goes off.
Tina Moon
Eureka Springs, Arkansas
Thank you for the recent issue of The Mindfulness Bell. I
especially appreciated the many articles on Jim Fauss.
Although I did not know him when he was alive, I now feel
that I do know him and I am enriched for the experience.
Bob Repoley
Charlotte, North Carolina
I was particularly pleased that you printed Fred Eppsteiner's
letter in the last issue, as I felt that he raised substantial
questions regarding Sangha building in a genuinely kind
way. I was also interested in the article in a previous issue of
The Mindfulness Bell which raised the issue of finding ways
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to invite African Americans into the Order of Interbeing.
These invitations to dialogue will, I feel, serve The Mindfulness
Bell very well in its long-term commitment to growth
and to reaching a wider reading public.
Mushim Ikeda-Nash
Oakland, California
I agree with Fred Eppsteiner's letter that longer articles,
where issues could be discussed in greater depth, would
make The Mindfulness Bell more interesting to a wider
range of readers. In addition, I would like to see more
articles on the history of Vietnamese Buddhism. This is our
"ancestral tradition," but it is virtually unknown in the West.
Western Buddhism must find its own forms and expressions,
but a greater knowledge of those who went before us
would certainly be useful.
Fred also commented, "I sometimes wonder if anybody
in the Sangha is having traditional spiritual experiences in
meditation, awakenings ... which have been the experience
and hard-won fruits of Buddhists for thousands of years." I
think people in our Sangha do have such experiences, but
they are not much talked about. This may be a good thing.
In the Rinzai Zen tradition where I practiced before, one
pursued such experiences relentlessly, putting a lot of
pressure on people and sacrificing interest in ethics and
daily life practice. This strongly goal-oriented attitude made
it very hard to enjoy the present moment. Probably too
much of the focus in Western Zen has been on experience,
satori, sudden awakenings, etc., and we have tended to
neglect the gradual practice of transforming mental knots.
Thay's teachings address all kinds of suffering-psychological,
interpersonal, social, ecological- as well as the
great spiritual questions.
We don't need to create barriers between psychotherapy
and meditation, but must remember that meditation has a
dimension of silence and going beyond personal issues that
we may rarely find in psychotherapy. Iffew people write
about this aspect, it may be out of modesty-not wanting to
claim "great insights"-but it may also be for lack of
language! I suspect that many modern people have become
alienated from the language of Christianity (and possibly
Judaism), and experience it as too filled with dualistic
connotations. And we don't always know the language of
Buddhism well enough to express spiritual insights. The old
Chinese Zen masters were great artists when it came to
giving new and fresh words to the practice and insights of
Buddhism. It's silly to copy them, but their challenge is
valid: how can we express our deepest, most transforming
experiences?
Svein Myreng
Oslo, Norway